Long Debate Ends in Vote to Reopen Short Street in Agoura Hills

The Agoura Hills City Council voted to reopen controversial Medfield Street on a limited basis after about two hours of public testimony that included a country and western serenade.

The street will be open to eastbound traffic only and heavy trucks will be banned.

The Committee to Close Medfield, a group of residents who oppose reopening the street because they say it brings noise and traffic dangers to the Old Agoura neighborhood, charged that the council’s action Wednesday night was illegal. Members of the committee said that an environmental study was necessary before the road could be reopened, and that they will fight the council vote in court.

Medfield Street runs for less than a mile from Kenwood Street on the west, past the Dale Poe Industrial Park, to Lewis Road on the east.

It was built in 1978 by developer Dale Poe as a temporary access for construction traffic during the building of the industrial center without approval by Los Angeles County. Neither the county nor the city, which was incorporated in 1982, was willing to accept legal liability for the road, which the county closed August 3.

The City Council’s 4-1 vote called for accepting that liability in the form of an easement from the county, which still owns the road. If the county grants the easement, as expected, the council vote would reopen Medfield Street by October and keep it open for no more than two years while an alternate route is constructed.

Wednesday’s council vote came after a month of controversy over severe traffic jams city officials said were caused by the closure of the street, one of only two routes from the city’s primary industrial and commercial area to the Ventura Freeway.

Traffic jams formed along the other route, which passes through the city’s worst intersection for traffic accidents, Kanan Road and Canwood Street. Since the closure, the city has had to pay for sheriff’s deputies to direct traffic at the Kanan-Canwood intersection.

Added traffic at that intersection is putting many who live or work in Agoura Hills in danger, argued those who urged the council to reopen the street.

Among them was Terry Canady, 47, a Glendale resident who works for an Agoura Hills towing company. Canady brought his guitar to the podium and sang a country-style song he wrote titled “Poor Little Medfield.”

“Poor little Medfield, disliked and abused,” he sang. “For years, such a servant, but now it’s not used.”

Opponents of the street saw the matter differently.

“It’s unfortunate that the city has turned its back on the residents, condemning us to live with this roadway,” Diane Venable, a leader of the Committee to Close Medfield, said after the meeting. She questioned whether the 10,000-pound limit the council imposed on vehicles using Medfield Street was low enough.

The committee’s lawyer, G. Greg Aftergood, told the council that state law requires an environmental impact report before the street can be reopened.

But City Atty. Gregory Stepanicich advised the council that because the road had been open to two-way traffic--including trucks--from the time of the city’s 1982 incorporation until last month, such a study was not required.

Voting to open the road were council members Louise Rishoff and Fran Pavley, Mayor pro tem Darlene McBane and Mayor Jack W. Koenig.

The opposing vote was cast by Vicky Leary, who said the $10,000 that will be spent on reopening the street could be spent instead on the alternate route the city plans to construct by extending Canwood street to the east.